Chapter Text
She crouched over Vision's dead, greying body, hands quivering over his colourless chest. Her lip trembled, tears dropping soundlessly from her speechless lips. When she felt her toes begin to tingle and a wispy feeling began to drift up her body, she leaned into it. Death was a relief.
Then she woke up.
“Where is Vision?”
“WE HAVE TO GO, COME ON!” a man’s voice, loud and assertive.
“He’s all alone, where is he? I need to find him!” she begged, frantic.
“IT’S BEEN FIVE YEARS, COME ON, THEY NEED US!”
And then she was flying, magic pulsing around her fingertips as a portal opened and she touched down onto a battlefield. Blood was pounding in her ears, and she struggled to push down her panic. Dirt crunched under her feet and the smell of sulphur was strong. Voices filtered into her head, her telepathic abilities flaring as they tended to when she lost control of her emotions. She took a deep, stuttering breath, focusing on pushing the jumbled words out and reigning her magic back in.
Debris was everywhere, crushed rock and large pieces of infrastructure littered the ground. She brought her eyes up from the floor and looked around wildly, searching for a familiar face. As she scanned the assembled fighters she found herself focusing on Steve’s shocked and disbelieving gaze. She inclined her head at him slightly. It spoke to how well they had gotten to know each other that he understood her look and nodded. Tentatively, she let her eyes glow red and reached out to look into his mind. Pictures flicked across his thoughts like an old television show, tinted in guilt, grief, and loss. She saw the gravestones of the dusted, felt the hopelessness of the search to reverse it, and heard the quiet sobs Steve had shed in his bedroom when no one was listening. She let the red fade from her vision and stared at him. He tipped his head to her, a silent apology.
She felt a distinct lack of shock at how long she had apparently been gone. Overwhelmingly, she felt empty. Endless nothingness, stretching into a neverending horizon. She had nothing and no one to return to. Nodding stiffly to Steve, Wanda pushed her stifling grief down and turned to focus on the threat. Dying wasn’t going to help her bury Vision and it wasn’t going to get her revenge.
She scanned the opposite field and spotted him. Her mood shifted instantly, red rising up her body and flaring into her hands. Thanos. This was her chance. Hatred pooled in the depths of her chest, rising and swirling dangerously. Her lips turned up into a snarl as she fought to keep a grip on herself. Others joined the ranks beside her, more avengers as well as Wakadian warriors and sorcerers of the mystic arts. Around her, friends and teammates were slipping into ready stances, awaiting orders from the Captain.
“Avengers…..ASSEMBLE!”
She was off in an instant, rising high above the ground to gather momentum and coming down like a comet to strike the dirt. As she did, she threw a ball of glowing red energy so hard it flew right through a large alien crony, killing him on the spot. Orders were being spat through the coms; Ironman, Captain America and Thor were to attack Thanos first, the rest were to take out as many of the other aliens as possible and wait for further instruction. She didn’t like it but she obeyed in respect for the Captain. She bode her time, taking out her rage, grief, and frustration on every alien that was stupid enough to get into her way.
Grunts could be heard down the coms as the supersoldier, god, and genius struggled to keep the titan at bay.
“I can’t hold him much longer... augh!” came a strangled cry from Ironman across the field. She heard his tinny voice crack from the com as he was flung in the opposite direction and landed with a hard thump. Wanda hissed as the sudden loud voice took her off guard and she took a small nick to her forearm.
“We need another plan, fast,” Tony warned, grunting as he lifted himself up. “Strange’s buddies are taking over to keep him busy for now, but I don’t think it’ll last long.”
“Team, ideas?” Captain America shot out, heavy, sharp, and to the point.
Wanda ended the monster she was fighting with a wrist flick that sent him flying miles into the distance. She cracked her neck, snarling.
"My turn."
“Wanda?” the captain questioned, but she paid him no mind. Fifty minutes ago, she had sat by her dead soulmate’s feet and watched the mad purple titan leave with the stone that had given him life. The others had had years to compartmentalize their pain. For her, it was fresh; not even an hour had passed.
Vision. Calm, sweet, loving Vision who had been her only lifeline in a lifetime of loss. Vision, who had held her the night her brother died and reminded her that he was still alive inside her, persevered in the depths of her memories. Vision, who had understood how it felt to be different, how it felt to have people fear your mere existence on the basis of unfamiliarity. Vision, who has died twice trying to save the ungrateful universe.
Red sparked to life in her open palms, and she began walking forward. Thanos' army paid little attention to the small girl as she marched across the battlefield. Any stray enemy that crossed her path was viciously thrown aside in a flame of red and toss of her hand. The battle continued beside her as her friends and teammates valiantly fought to keep the gauntlet from Thanos' grip. As she passed Clint and Bucky, who were caught in a particularly nasty group of monsters, she stopped, crossed her arms into an X, hands flaming, and harshly pulled them back to her sides. The monsters ripped into pieces and disintegrated. The two assassins stared up at her, slightly shocked as their enemies crumbled, but she didn't notice. She was already moving again, red tendrils spilling from the spheres in her hands and beginning to drift and swirl around her. Her eyes began to burn brightly.
Sweltering savagery was building behind her iris’ and in the palms of her hands, rising and choking her in a swell of power. She felt strong, light, indestructible. Red was billowing around her thickly now, spilling into the air and disintegrating every enemy limb it touched. She spotted the purple titan on the far right of the field, delivering a final blow to what looked like one of Wong's sorcerer friends, grabbing the gauntlet from her limp feet. The monster spat a wad of blood at the sorcerer's broken body with a curled lip, then turned to face the field again. Wanda caught the moment he saw her, stalking towards him in a tornado of scarlet light. He picked up the gauntlet and narrowed his eyes, sword in his other hand, pointed and ready. Malice glinted in every crevice of his face.
The blatant disrespect of the fallen woman only finalized her resolve. With a spiteful yell, Wanda propelled herself straight up into the air and came streaking down in a tsunami of energy that knocked the sword right from his grip and left him staggering back. She saw his eyes widen just slightly and flicker to his ship. Following his gaze, she held his stare and lifted her left hand, sending her magic spiralling to the sky in a thick tendril. Magic wrapped itself quickly around the aircraft, pulsing and squeezing the metal casing. With a growl, she slowly pulled her fingers together, crushing the metal high above. With a flick of her wrist, the ruined aircraft was flying backwards and out of sight.
"You. Took. EVERYTHING. From me." she spat, a picture of glowing eyes and ruby flames.
Thanos growled as he looked up at the smoke still drifting from where his ruined aircraft had once floated.
"I don't even know who you are."
"Oh,” she laughed without humour, "you will."
Thanos reached to put on the gauntlet, but she was too quick, immobilizing his hand in a haze of red light. Holding him still with one hand, she pulled her other hand into a claw, levitating a mass of debris and crushed rock and bringing her arm back to throw it at the mad titan as hard as she could. He stumbled at the sheer impact of the point bank hit, falling onto the hard ground. She strode forward, jacket billowing out behind her. Before he could even raise his head her magic was moving again, thin fingers of red string wrapping around his limbs and lifting him into the sky. Gracefully, her feet left the ground to follow, and they drifted two hundred feet into the air. Ruby mist wisped from the woman, wrapping around the girl and her prisoner and keeping them both afloat. Red was everywhere now, weaving its way from her hands, flowing around her red hair and glowing from her eyes. Thanos hung stiffly, a statue in the confines of her extended grip.
"Little witch..." he spat between clenched teeth, seemingly too angry to form a complete sentence.
"Careful, what you say to me," she hissed, smiling eerily.
Her eyes dropped to the gauntlet at his side, and her eyes flashed brighter.
"All this," she swept her hand to the battlefield below, "for a few stones? So you could choose who lives and who dies?"
"It is my destiny," he seethed.
"No, your destiny was to die. I'm here to deliver."
Testingly, she stretched her right hand out, letting a narrow rope of red magic curl and twist around empty air, reaching to where the gauntlet was limply hanging. He watched her focus with realization dawning.
"That will destroy you, little one. The stones were meant to be wielded by ones fated to change the universe. Your kind is not equipped to hold such power."
“I don’t remember asking for advice”, she stated calmly, eyes on the gauntlet. Her Sokovian accent was thick. "And I don't need you to tell me who I am."
Her magic connected to the gauntlet, and she jolted as what felt like the very synapses of her brain lit with a fire of overwhelming, all-encompassing power. Something inside her broke, flooding out of her chest in a wild wind of scarlet. She curled in slightly where she hung midair, then burst. A hurricane of red light flooded from her chest and swirled around her body, spinning faster and faster. Blinding red spilled over her skin, seeping from every pore. In the eye of the storm, she inclined her head, feeling the flow of the world tilt and shift, adjusting to her will. She raised her arms serenely, conjuring swirling red magic into the space between her two hands. The blinding light began to fade as she formed it into a ball and let it fade back into her skin.
Thanos looked back at her with squinted eyes, adjusting to the lighting change. Wanda floated in front of him, a glittering crown floating above her temples and her body swathed in a red, sweeping dress.
"Witch…" he whispered to himself, disbelieving and accepting.
"Scarlet Witch, to you," she smiled sharply. As soon as the smile appeared, it was gone, and she snarled manically, raising her left hand to hold him still and using her right to jerk sharply, ripping the mad creature in half. The two pieces disintegrated into red ash and were carried off on a red-tinged breeze.
She fell to the earth in an inordinate sea of red energy, connecting to the ground in a wave of ruby light that hit the dirt and spread in streams of fine red fire. The rest of Thanos' army disappeared into a dust storm of maroon particles. She felt more than heard the cacophony of confusion and disbelief being shouted down the battlefield as the Avengers rushed down the field to meet her.
The Scarlet Witch stood in the center of chaos, panting. Vision avenged, she allowed herself to drop to her knees in the middle of the carnage, magic swirling as it sank back into her skin.
The fallen gauntlet glittered on the ground in the fading light of the battlefield. As Wanda sat, breathless, the innocently placed stones seemed to tremble in their holders. She stared on, eyes glowing luminescent red as the sounds around her faded. Distantly, in stark contrast to her suddenly silent surroundings, she heard two voices—young, male.
They were calling out "mom.”